Group hopes its latest Tweetfest draws new people to pro-life movement

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WASHINGTON (CNS) — ProLife Youth hopes its July 15 Tweetfest will raise the visibility of the pro-life movement and attract new followers, the organization’s vice president said.

Using the hashtag #ProLifeYouth, the Tweetfest was scheduled for 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. EDT.

“Because it is so accessible, the higher the hashtag trends the harder it is to not notice the hashtag. I think seeing so many people in high school and college-age (groups) tweeting about this and taking the internet by storm is a very powerful thing to see,” said Evan Ward, a 21-year-old from East Lansing, Michigan, who has been ProLife Youth’s vice president since the summer of 2014.

ProLife Youth has Tweetfests twice a year — one in the summer and one in the winter. The events aim to show that contrary to what the media portrays, youth are pro-life.

Last year, the summer Tweetfest hashtag trended in the top 100 in the U.S. and was at No. 3 in Washington.

Ward told Catholic News Service that he thinks youth who are not pro-life or are undecided are impacted by the Tweetfests because “they will see the amount of people participating, and that it is not a crazy movement but instead (attracting) a statistical majority of youths.”

Ward said he believes those most touched by the Tweetfests and who benefit most from them are those who have never thought about being pro-life or those who think they do not have a say.

ProLife Youth, he said, uses a Tweetfest as a way to raise awareness of pro-life issues because “it is an untapped market. There is not really a scheduled hashtag tweeting event that I know of, not just in pro-life circles but in general. Most of the times when a hashtag trends, it’s because something in the world happens and a hashtag is a response to that. This is something that we plan with the intention of people tweeting this hashtag.”

The organization invited some high-profile people to participate in the July 15 Tweetfest, including governors, members of Congress, Christian bands and even the Robertsons, the Louisiana family of “Duck Dynasty” reality TV show fame.

ProLife Youth was founded in October 2012 in Northern Virginia by Claire Lejeune.

“We are a youth-led movement,” the organization says on its website, www.theprolifeyouth.com. “Our goal is to educate youth through different means as a way to eliminate abortion and instead, encourage a culture of life.”